Welcome
to
Lawley Cottage's year of 2004

2004 seems to have gone so
quickly ! Where does the time go ?

Trying to trace what we've done over the past
year we found we actually had quite a few photos from quite a few things. In
retrospect, some of the events are now hard to place exactly when they occurred
but some are obvious.

Sparky's Mum and Dad (Doreen and Ron) came to
visit at the start of the year and we managed to treat them to the adventure of
retrieving Wit’s car from out at Mount
Hay. (The keys having drowned whilst canyoning and stranding us there).

Not long after, and still in January, Sparky
arranged tickets to a live performance of the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
in honour of Nicola's birthday. After that we stopped by in DarlingHarbour just in time to see the water
skiing demo

Nicky's party was held at the climbing gym. As usual, the girls are always fairly
quiet there ...

Climbing was calling and a trip to Nowra was on the
horizon we were to meet the (in)famous "Werner
Burner". With that in mind we launched ourselves at Barrenjoey and Berowra for some warming up and Wit met Al for the
first time.

Al was preparing at that time to head off on
a kayaking tour, so we took the opportunity to ...
HAVE A PARTY!!! in honour of Elaine’s'
Birthday.

We explored making our own Easter egg
decorations but the best ones are the Fimbles !

Now the heat of summer was fading and outdoor
activities were starting to multiply. Terry and Linda, ever famous for their
over night trips had planned a two day walk in the 'Blueys which was dubbed the
Pots, Cox, Dogs walk. Knowing how hard it can be
to keep up with them we embarked on a series of
ambitious work-up walks with Elaine through the spectacular Berowra area, (close to
home)...

With the weather turning cooler now, we both
jumped at the opportunity to take some time off together and head up to the Warrumbugles. Terry's
walking notes in hand ! But not before another training walk. This time around Manly. Would you believe we got covered in sleet !
At sea level ! In Sydney !!!

Winter finally arrived and with it the first
dumps of snow to our snow fields, and so we made hast to the lodge at Perisher. Later in the season
we embarked on an ambitious XC camping trip near
Guthega with Steph and Elaine. Here we met Barbara and David as well and had a
brilliant time skiing and walking and seeing of the famed and fabled regions
heading up onto our main range.

Somewhere around here we even managed to fit
in a White Christmas as well !

Spring time and after one of the hottest and
driest summer/autumn/winter combinations, our
garden absolutely exploded into life. With it, the bird life that came
visiting was equally spectacular.. Even Tweety Pie !

Keeping the figurative ball rolling activity
wise, we managed to entertain everyone with out results in a few Rogaines and more
recently had a wonderful day cycling around Canberra competing in the Urban Polaris

A little more climbing out at Tarana came to fruition,
and we were enlightened to the ways of granite slabs ... A big difference to
the juggy sandstone we are used to !

More enjoyable weekends with Nicky and
Rebecca. We had long planned to take them horse
riding. Sparky definitely has a talent for this! But I came back wanting to
buy a horse!